San Francisco: Culinary Capital

Forty years after the Bay Area changed how America eats, the pioneering food region is surging ahead again.

By

Charlotte Druckman

Updated Dec. 5, 2013 11:57 a.m. ET

In 2009, celebrity chef and Momofuku emperor David Chang lobbed a now legendary critique at the Bay Area food scene: "Every restaurant in San Francisco is just serving figs on a plate," he complained. Just two years after the much-cited incident, Chang hailed chef Corey Lee's South of Market–district restaurant Benu the best in the country. It was a testament to how much Northern California's culinary landscape has changed in the past few years, and a sign of where it might be headed as a contender on the international...